FSB Author Article
Excerpt
The following is an excerpt from the book Unattended Sorrow: Recovering
from Loss and Reviving the Heart
by Stephen Levine
Published by Rodale; February; $23.95 US; 1-59486-065-3
Copyright
©
2005 by Stephen Levine
A DAY IN THE HEART OF PAIN
WHAT WOULD IT BE LIKE TO AWAKEN TO A DAY WITH OUR HEARTS
open to our pain?
What would it be like to approach the mean habit of rejecting our pain,
which turns it into suffering, with mercy and awareness? When we are no
longer
mesmerized by our wounds or making a religion of the pain by which we
so
often define ourselves, we stop running for our lives.
Some years ago, sitting next to a fifteen-month-old child whose cancer
had
begun in her mother's womb, as I prayed for her life, some- thing very
deep
inside told me to stop, that I didn't know enough to make such a
prayer.
It said that I was just second-guessing God. That I could not really
comprehend
what her spirit might have needed next, that only this pain in this
fleeting
body, which was being torn from the hearts of her loved ones, might
teach
her as she evolved toward her ceaseless potential. That she, like us
all,
was in the lap of the mystery, and that the only appropriate prayer
was,
"May you get the most out of this possible!"
Sharing our healing, we send wishes for the well-being of all those
who,
like ourselves, find themselves in a difficult moment, as the heart
whispers,
"May we all get the most out of this possible."
And we can say to ourselves, in appreciation of the healing potential
of
approaching with mercy and awareness that which so recently may have
been
an aversion to our situation, "May I get the most out of this
possible."
It is said that nothing is true until we have experienced it, so as an
experiment
in sending love where the fear is, we can use the presence of mild pain
to
test the truth of softening and sending mercy into an area of our body
that
is perhaps captured in the constriction of fear. Knowing that working
with
physical pain demonstrates a means of working with mental pain as well,
we
can let go of the tension around physical discomfort.
If you watch closely, you'll notice that when you experience physical
pain,
you ostracize and isolate that part of yourself. You close off what is
calling
out for your help. We do the same thing with our grief.
When you stub your toe, more than physical pain is generated; grief is
released
into the wound, followed by a litany of dissatisfactions and "poor
me's,"
a damning of God sent heavenward. When we trip and fall in the darkness
we
are all too ready to curse ourselves for being so clumsy, as well as
for
not being able to hold our bladder until dawn, for not counting the
hours
in our just-expended 1,000-hour lightbulb, and the bruise is suffused
with
self-judgment and an irrational sense of responsibility.
The next time you have a minor wound, such as a stubbed toe or bumped
elbow,
note how long it takes that wound--when you soften to it and use it as
a
focus for loving kindness--to heal. Then compare it with the number of
days
it takes a similar wound to heal when you turn away from it, allowing
the
fear and resistance that rushes toward it to mercilessly remain.
Contrast
the healing of an injury in the mind or body in which loving kindness
has
gradually gathered to one that has been abandoned.
This softening and opening around pain has been shown in several
double-blind
studies to provide greater access of the immune system to an area of
injury.
It opens the vice of resistance into a never-considered acceptance of
the
moment. It denies hopelessness a home. It proves we are not helpless,
that
we can actively intercede in what we previously believed we had only to
endure.
Working with our pain, or the pain of loved ones, cultivates a mercy
that
allows us to stay one more moment at their bedside when we are most
needed.
It allows us to not run away.
To open some of our healing potential, soften around the pain to melt
the
resistance that isolates it. Enter it with mercy, instead of walling it
off
with fear. Pass through the barricades of fear and distrust that
attempt
to defend the pain. Let what seems an improbable love--the ultimate
acceptance
of our pain--enter the cluster of sensations that so agitate the mind
and
body.
It takes patience to let go of doubt. So many fears warn us against
opening
beyond the numbness that surrounds pain. But when we allow ourselves to
be
open to and investigate these fears, we come to see them and our
negative
attachment to them, our compulsive warring with them, as a great
unkindness
to ourselves. As we open into our pain we may weep with gratitude when
at
last the pain does not so much disappear as become dispersed through
the
gradually expanding spaciousness of awareness.
As pain teaches us that fear can be penetrated by mercy and awareness,
from
some inherent knowing there resonates from our suffering a perfect
teaching
in compassion. We find in our pain the pain we all share. Softening
around
pain with mercy instead of hardening it with fear, the heart expands as
"my'
pain becomes "the" pain. Odd as it may sound, when we share the
insights
arising from our pain we become more able to honor the
pain.
Following a tributary from the personal to the universal, we can find
in
our pain the pain of others as well. In our own wish to
be
free of suffering, others are calling out to be freed from their
difficulties.
Finding them in ourselves, the loving kindness that we extend to all
sentient
beings moves Earth toward heaven.
When we meet pain with mercy, there is a silent sigh of understanding and relief that can serve the whole world. There is exposed a meaning to life, a connection through ourselves to all others, that proposes a balm to the suffering in the world.
Reprinted from Unattended Sorrow: Recovering from Loss and Reviving the Heart by Stephen Levine © 2005 by Stephen Levine. Permission granted by Rodale, Inc., Emmaus, PA 18098. Available wherever books are sold or directly from the publisher by calling (800) 848-4735 or visit their website at www.rodalestore.com.